After more than a week the development community seems to be unwilling to engage these issues here. One developer said that he was uninterested in getting into a protracted debate responding to endless comments - in other words a dialog. Don’t get me wrong, I can well imagine that they do not view this blog as a friendly landscape. The problem is that these are the people who are, in a very real sense, designing and building our city. While they are under absolutely no obligation to engage in a dialog here, there is a mandate for them to become more engaged with the community in the decisions that they are making in a way that shows some degree of self management. Currently the whole development community is getting painted with the same big brush and that brush is dipped into the paint of Weingarten. I know members of the development community who do not deserve to be painted in these hues, but they will be increasingly characterized in this way if there is not some effort from within the development community to engage in dialog with the wider community under the shared goal of making profits by improving the quality of life in College Station. Currently realtors, builders, attorneys and others who serve the development community are raising money to support City Council candidates who will give free reign to uncontrolled development. While there is no doubt that the developers driving these efforts are influential. I’m banking on the idea that ultimately the people of College Station are more influential in making decisions about the quality of life that we want for our community. To make this influence felt we must:
1) Monitor what is happening with development
2) Monitor who is financing City Council candidates
3) Insist on increased community control of development
I know that there are responsible members of the development community who care about the quality of life in our community and who are clever enough to figure out how to improve profits by supplying what the community demands. Standing with those who seek to trade on a more shortsighted equation for personal profit at the expense of the community’s quality of life does not make sense for these smart business people who are looking to the vast long term profitable opportunities created when you are committed to your customers.
Saturday, February 16, 2008
UNCOMFORTABLE ALLIANCES
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5 comments:
Hugh,
I certainly do not pretend to represent the development community because I have only been involved in one relatively small residential project in this area, while the "development community" is composed of a very diverse group of extremely independent thinkers. However, my wife and I care deeply about sustainable development (both environmental and economic), increased density in our city center, mixed use where appropriate, infill development and long-term, comprehensive planning to manage our growth. In fact, my family invested our life savings into bringing the first "cluster style" development to this area, partly in an effort to help prove that ecologically sound development practices can also be profitable. We also planned to dedicate some of our lots for zero-energy homes, but we have yet to find a builder or home-buyer who is willing to take that leap. While far from being a complete success, our experiment has taught us a lot and we hope the shift away from traditional thinking about development and construction practices will continue to accelerate and market forces will respond. If you are interested, I would be willing to participate in a dialogue with you about how we might go about achieving our common goals because I think our views about what types of public policy should be pursued might differ substantially. Personally, I would find the conversation quite interesting.
Derek,
Thank you for chiming in. You are certainly right about the development community being a group of diverse thinkers. The problem is that they are acting in harmony. Or, to be more precise, those who are acting are doing so in harmony. I know that there is a lot of diversity in the development community and that there are many people in that community who are concerned about the same things that other citizens are concerned about in terms of run away cheap development. The problem is that the people who are acting are those who are promoting cheap development over smart development. Many are just assuming that this is what is best for development in the Brazos Valley and others are just being silent. So I am very grateful to have you speaking to these issues.
I must admit though that I am made skeptical by the fact that you are running for City Council against the one person who has done the most to bring attention and action to developing more intelligent formulas for growth in the Brazos Valley. This is especially true when there is an unopposed sitting council member whose record on development issues is abysmal, unless you are a fan of big box formula businesses and sprawl. There is no doubt that you will be well financed by the development community to run against John Crompton. There is also no doubt that you will lose credibility in talking about environmental, green building or quality of life issues. For you to say that you support green initiatives in building and development at the same time that you are opposing the person who has single handedly brought these issues into our community dialog and is working with a wide cross section of the community to see to it that these very initiatives get implemented with intelligence, threatens your integrity and suggests that you may be underestimating the intelligence of College Station voters.
Over the last several years we have watched the cost of running for City Council soar. This has been because our penchant for cheap development has attracted the attention of outside developers who have been pumping money in to support candidates that they can count on to allow, and even subsidize, sprawl development at the determent of our quality of life. But we are a well educated and smart community and we caught on fairly quickly. Candidates supported by the development community have not faired so well in College Station over the last several elections despite outspending their opponents by a considerable amount.
I hope that you are sincere in your declaration of your interests in aggressive smart development that is both environmentally and economically sustainable. You can demonstrate that by switching your candidacy to run against Chris Scotti. In so doing you can show real leadership and gain a huge amount of community support. We need candidates, in more than one race, who will articulate and support strong development from a new paradigm. Are you such a leader?
At least for now the people of College Station have had enough of this strip mall mentality. It sounds like Mr. Dictson has some good ideas, but I'm with you, if he believes what he is saying why is running against John Crompton of all people? I hope that he will provide an answer to that question.
Hugh,
I am willing to participate in a respectful dialogue, and I understand that you are a John Crompton supporter (which I can respect), but I do not want to get into a conversation in this forum where my motives and sincerity are attacked when I am one of the very few folks in this community actually putting my own resources at risk to implement sustainable development concepts. It is my personal belief that actions speak louder than words, and that is why I continue to complement you for your tangible efforts to help "green" our community. As for myself, I prefer to let my record in this area speak for itself. I may not have my name on a park, but I have dedicated land and paid to build one. Everyone should understand that very few of our parks would exist without developers who give the land to the city and pay fees to build them, so if we want more parks we need to either ensure that developers keep investing in our community or be willing to pay for them through steep tax increases…
Why am I running for Place 1...that is a fair question that actually has very little to do with the topic we have been discussing and more to do with my basic beliefs about the proper role of government and the formation of good public policy. There is much more to running a City than creating parks and green space. We also have to ensure that we have a balanced and growing economy; sufficient resources to fund our core services of police, fire, transportation and facilities; consistent, predictable and transparent public policy that will encourage investment in our community; policymakers who are open and understanding of those who they may not agree with; long-range comprehensive plans to guide our growth without destroying property rights or distorting market forces through over-regulation; and cooperative solutions that focus on effectively solving specific problems and avoid blanket discrimination against any segment our population.
I do not like the fact that our city has become driven by conflict and quarrel. We consistently have the East Side vs. the West Side; Students vs. Retirees; City vs. ETJ; Developers vs. Neighborhoods; and on and on with little serious dialogue or effort at understanding and compromise by any of the parties. We have far too much going for us as a community to be reduced to potentially harmful reactionary public policy or gridlock on critical issues that we must get right if we want to accomplish our common goals.
I plan to spend the rest of my life in College Station, and I want my young children to have the opportunity to get a first-class education, find good jobs, enjoy a wonderful quality of life and raise their families here as well. It is short-sighted to reduce all of these important issues to a referendum on parks and green space.
Derek,
Thank you for engaging in this dialog. I am honored and I think that it speaks well of your commitment to openness and transparency. I am sorry that you are feeling attacked. That was not my intention. I was raising a legitimate question about a specific action that you are taking that seems to contradict some of what you are claiming as your values. That question is on the minds of many voters in College Station. I will not be the only one to ask you these questions. You are well served by having me raise that question, and continue to push it, in this format where you have an opportunity to ponder and construct your answer.
Let me also say that life constantly questions the integrity of each of us. Failures in integrity do not often wear the black hat of malevolent intention. More often they come as small, overlooked seductions or persuasions. None of us are immune. In my experience integrity is not a God given attribute; it is all a lot of hard work that comes from constant questioning. No public servant is above questioning and only the most egregious failures should be globalized.
I do not doubt that you are doing great things with your development, in fact I would love to learn more about it. But when you oppose the person who has done the most to move our community in the direction of sustainability and try to claim that as your platform you have to expect to be challenged. This is most especially true when you leave unchallenged someone whose record on development does not go in that direction. As far as I know Chris is not claiming to be promoting sustainability in our development patterns. In fact, like you, he is supports minimal restriction on property rights, which is entirely different than suggesting that he is green.
I will address the issues of property rights and conflict on the front page. I am more than happy to promote one of your responses in its entirety to the front page if you would like but I would also like to offer you the opportunity to write something for the front page that is not a reaction to what I have said. That can be about property rights or any platform issue that you wish.
Thanks again for participating,
Hugh
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